Category Archives: Resisting Islamophobia

It’s no slur to be called a Muslim

Posted on by Bob Pitt

ObamaTurbanNaomi Klein on Barack Obama’s response to the “Muslim smear” campaign:

“What is disturbing about the campaign’s response is that it leaves unchallenged the disgraceful and racist premise behind the entire ‘Muslim smear’: that being Muslim is de facto a source of shame. Obama’s supporters often say they are being ‘Swift-boated’ (a pejorative term derived from the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign against the 2004 presidential candidate John Kerry), casually accepting the idea that being accused of Muslimhood is tantamount to being accused of treason.

“Substitute another faith or ethnicity, and you’d expect a very different response. Consider a report from the archives of the Nation. Thirteen years ago Daniel Singer, the magazine’s late Europe correspondent, went to Poland to cover a presidential election. He reported that the race had descended into an ugly debate over whether one of the candidates, Aleksander Kwasniewski, was a closet Jew. The press claimed his mother was buried in a Jewish cemetery (she was still alive), and a popular TV show aired a skit featuring the Christian candidate dressed as a Hassidic Jew. ‘What perturbed me,’ Singer said, ‘was that Kwasniewski’s lawyers threatened to sue for slander rather than press for an indictment under the law condemning racist propaganda’.

“We should expect no less of the Obama campaign. When asked during the Ohio debate about Louis Farrakhan’s support for his candidacy, Obama did not hesitate to call Farrakhan’s antisemitic comments ‘unacceptable and reprehensible’. When the turban photo flap came up in the same debate, he used the occasion to say nothing at all.”

Guardian, 1 March 2008

Muslim ejected from Louisiana mall over hijab

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today called on local, state and national law enforcement authorities to investigate a recent incident in which a Muslim woman was allegedly ejected from a Louisiana shopping mall for refusing a security guard’s demand to remove her religiously-mandated headscarf, or hijab.

CAIR said the 54-year-old woman and her daughter-in-law were leaving the food court of the Oakwood Mall in the New Orleans suburb of Gretna, La., on February 22 when a security guard approached them and allegedly told the older woman that she had two options: remove her headscarf or leave the mall. (The woman’s daughter-in-law was not wearing a headscarf.) The guard did not offer an explanation for his demand.

During the long walk out of the mall, the guard reportedly followed the women and even called for back-up. The daughter-in-law told CAIR that the two women felt “humiliated” by the stares of other shoppers as the guard followed them out of the mall. When two more guards came to the scene, they did not offer assistance to the women, but they did confirm the reason for the first guard’s ejection order. The family, all of whom are American citizens of Palestinian heritage, has retained an attorney and is exploring their legal options.

“It is unbelievable that an American of any faith would be denied access to a public area merely because she wished to carry out the requirements of her faith,” said CAIR National Legal Counsel Nadhira Al-Khalili. “We call on local law enforcement authorities and the FBI to determine whether any civil rights or criminal laws were violated during this disturbing incident.”

CAIR press release, 29 February 2008

Islamophobia, Obamaphobia

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Barack Obama“Some of the dirtiest attacks against Barack Obama are being carried out by Jewish bigots in the US and Israel, and if Obama is the Democrats’ candidate for president, which looks very likely, these smears are going to get a lot worse.

“It’s not a whispering campaign, it’s not anonymous; Marc Zell, co-chairman of Republicans Abroad in Israel, put his name to an article in The Jerusalem Post’s Web edition last week that brands Obama as a Muslim anti-Semite. ‘Obama and the Jews‘ begins: ‘Less than two weeks before the critical primary elections in Ohio and Texas, Democratic voters have made it very clear: Barack Hussein Obama is for real.’

“Why would a Republican activist mention Obama’s middle name, especially in the first sentence, especially to readers of The Jerusalem Post? Everyone knows the reason, but I’ll spell it out anyway: To reinforce the false impression that Obama is a Muslim, knowing that many readers, Jewish and Christian, will hate and fear him for that reason alone….

“The record on Obama as an anti-Semite or enemy of Israel is utterly blank. He’s not a Muslim, either. (Although it doesn’t speak well for America that he can’t publicly say, ‘And what if I was?’ without killing his chances for election.) But it doesn’t matter – he’s caused legions of Jewish crazies to come crawling out of the woodwork….

“Yes, there is a problem of black anti-Semitism in America, but Obama isn’t part of it. There’s a problem of bigotry among American Jews, but Joseph Lieberman isn’t part of that. If American blacks or Muslims were running an ethnic/religious smear campaign against Lieberman like Jewish extremists are running against Obama, what would Jews call it? We’d call it anti-Semitic. The one against Obama is Islamophobic, with an undercurrent of white racism. It’s the exact same sort of bigotry.”

Larry Derfner in the Jerusalem Post, 27 February 2008

‘Respect brings people together’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A Muslim leader has opposed comments by Tory leader David Cameron in a speech in which he said the introduction of Sharia law would undermine British society. Speaking on the issue for the first time since the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, made his controversial comments, Mr Cameron said adopting elements of Sharia law would lead to a “legal apartheid” and “state multiculturalism”. Ishtiaq Ahmed also criticised Mr Cameron’s understanding of multiculturalism.

Mr Ahmed, of the Bradford Council of Mosques, said: “In a country where people feel free to be able to live according to their ways of life while sharing certain basic values, then I think that enables people to contribute to – and take ownership of – their community. If society respects people’s cultural identities, values and heritage, it brings people together and creates an atmosphere of co-operation and support.”

Councillor Martin Smith, Bradford Council’s executive member for community safety, said: “Mr Cameron may feel like that if he is not in day-to-day contact with the situation, but those of us in Bradford who are in day-to-day contact with the Asian community feel there is a great understanding of where the situation needs to go. It’s not possible to say multiculturalism is not working in Bradford.”

Bradford Telegraph & Argus, 27 February 2008

Conference declares terror un-Islamic, condemns hostility to Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

DEOBAND — Denouncing terrorism in all its manifestations, top Muslim groups in India on Monday adopted a declaration calling it “un-Islamic” and terming it against the Islamic principle of “peace”.

The Anti-terrorism Conference organised by Islamic seminary Darul Uloom in Uttar Pradesh’s Deoband town was attended by clerics, scholars and religious leaders from several sects and groups across the country.

The conference, however, expressed its deep concern and agony on the present global condition in which most of the nations are adopting an adverse attitude towards Muslims. “It is a matter of greater concern that the internal and external policies of a country are getting heavily influenced by these forces,” it said.

The gathering also condemned attempts to implicate Muslims and particularly religious institutions for terrorist acts. “The disease (terrorism) has been diagnosed in a wrong way. Whenever there is any incident of terrorism, every possible attempt is made to link it to Muslims and particularly who have studied in madrassas and some religious institutions. This is totally wrong,” said Adil Siddiqui, public relations officer of Darul Uloom.

Times of India, 25 February 2008

Britain sent hundreds to face torture

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Britain sent hundreds to face tortureBritain sent hundreds to face torture

By Louise Nousratpour

Morning Star, 26 February 2008

FORMER SAS soldier Ben Griffin revealed yesterday that British troops in Iraq and Afghanistan were “deeply involved” in US torture flights.

Since the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, British special forces, operating in a joint US/UK task force, have been responsible for the detention of “hundreds, if not thousands” of individuals, he said. These detainees have since ended up in Baghdad’s infamous Abu Ghraib prison, Guantanamo Bay and other secret CIA locations.

“During my time as member of the US/UK task force, three of my colleagues witnessed a brutal interrogation in which near-drowning and electric cattle prods were used,” Mr Griffin told a Stop the War Coalition press conference. “The special forces’ policy of detention and not arrest was regarded as a clumsy legal tool used to distance British soldiers from the whole process. But my colleagues and I were in no doubt that anyone we detained, including non-combatants, would subsequently be tortured.”

Last week, Foreign Secretary David Miliband admitted to MPs that two US rendition flights transporting terror suspects had landed on British soil. But Mr Griffin said that this “pales into insignificance” to the actions of British forces, adding: “For the government to claim that they only became aware of the use of British territory this week is disingenuous.”

He rejected claims that the British army had acted as a bulwark against US torture in Iraq and Afghanistan, arguing: “In my experience, the opposite is true – that British soldiers have become more like their US counterparts. The British army has accepted illegality as the norm.”

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Witness to discrimination: what would you do?

Posted on by Bob Pitt

What would you do“The Sept. 11 attacks, the Iraq war and suicide bombings worldwide have changed not only the way we live but the way we look at those around us, especially Muslims. ‘Islamophobia’ has entered the American vernacular, and the anti-Muslim attitudes and prejudice it describes remain common. But what if you witnessed ‘Islamophobia’ in action and saw someone being victimized because of someone else’s prejudices? What would you do?”

ABC News, 26 February 2008